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Intersecting Sagas
Intersecting Sagas is the 17th chapter of Brisingr. It takes place from the view of Eragon. Summary The morning following Eragon's feast with the villagers of Carvahall, he is sitting in his tent oiling his hauberk when one of the Varden's archers comes and asks him to heal his wife's malignant tumor. Eragon completes the task, pleased with his efforts, but leaves tired. Afterward, Saphira tells him that others approached with requests, but they weren't urgent, so Blödhgarm and the other Elf-guards turned them away. Eragon suggests that he emulate Nasuada by holding a once-weekly council to listen to the Varden's requests. Eragon and Saphira make their way to Nasuada's pavilion to honor Eragon's promise to attempt to remove his curse from Elva. Along the way, they encounter Angela the herbalist and find her reading the knuckle bones of a dragon for a tall, black-haired woman and a teenage girl. Angela comments that Eragon and Saphira "always seem to turn up whenever the drop spindle of fate begins to spin." She asks Eragon to provide the two with his blessing, but Eragon is hesitant because of his earlier mistake with Elva. He asks Saphira and she tells him not to be reluctant because he has learned from his mistake. Eragon asks the two for their names and the tall, black-haired woman says that they'd prefer not to give them, as names have power. The teenage-girl gasps at this, but Eragon nods in agreement, as he doesn't actually need their names to complete the spell. He casts the spell on the woman and she rubs her arms, looking to Eragon "like a person trying to cleanse herself of some foul substance." Eragon moves on to the teenage girl and she seems to react better, as if she can feel the spell becoming part of her body. She thanks Eragon and wishes him luck in defeating Galbatorix and the Empire. Saphira then breathes on the faces of the two women and wishes them "good hunting," telling the dark-haired woman (whom she calls Wolf-Eyes) that she hopes she doesn't kill the person who left her paws in his traps too quickly when she finds him. "What, no marks upon their foreheads?" asks Eragon, and Saphira states that what she did with Elva was unique. Eragon asks Angela whom the women were and Angela describes them as "Pilgrims on their own quest." She refuses to provide any further information, and when Eragon states that unanswered questions pain him, she replies that he must spend every hour in agony, for life is full of unanswerable questions. Noticing Eragon's fatigue, she provides him with a hard brown lump flecked with flaxseeds that she says will sustain him till lunch. Noticing the calluses he has added to his knuckles, she compares them to the dwarves' Ascûdgamln. She says that she would consider something similar, except it would catch on the wool when she was knitting, which she considers a wonderful way to relax. She and Solembum accompany Eragon and Saphira to Nasuada's tent, and Angela asks Eragon if anything interesting happened to him during his journey through the Empire. Eragon mentions his encounter with Tenga, the hermit, and Angela seems shocked. She reveals that she was his apprentice for "an unfortunate number of years." She states that she thought he was already dead. Eragon asks Angela what question Tenga was working on, and she tells Eragon that Tenga always had a question he was trying to answer, but the one that he was working on when she left him was whether the phases of the moon influence the quality of the opals that form in the roots of the Beor Mountains. She elaborates that Tenga is deranged, but nevertheless brilliant. For his part, Solembum states "He is a man that kicks at cats." With that, Angela tells Eragon to proceed with eating his sweet so that they may proceed to Nasuada. Trivia * Eragon's healing of the cancerous growth of Signa, the wife of one of the Varden's archers named Gull, is given a brief mention at the beginning of this chapter. This healing, however, was originally described in detail, but was cut from the final version of Brisingr. The full version can be found in a deleted scene included in the deluxe edition of the book. pl:Krzyżujące się sagi (rozdział Brisingr)